Carbonaceous feedstocks such as biomass (biological material derived from living or recently living organisms), residuum, heavy oils (density or specific gravity higher than light crude oil such as an API gravity of less than 20) and relatively high organic content material may be converted to biooils or pyrolysis oils using pyrolysis in a circulating fluidized bed with an inert atmosphere or hydropyrolysis in an ebulating or fluidized bed with catalyst and hydrogen present. Such pyrolysis methods create products that contain relatively unstable oils or biofuels with unwanted heteroatoms, such as oxygen, sulfur, and nitrogen. These heteroatoms must then be hydrotreated in one or more subsequent stages to be removed from the oils or biofuel.
Accordingly, there is a need for better processes for efficiently producing biofuel such as pyrolysis oils that are relatively less polluting to the environment from selected carbonaceous feedstocks.